London, 10th May 2004 - Misys Wholesale Banking Systems (Misys) today announces that NORD/LB (Norddeutsche Landesbank Girozentrale), one of Germany’s most prestigious banking groups, has gone live with the Midas banking solution at its operation in Warsaw.

NORD/LB’s choice of system maintains its global IT strategy of standardising on Midas to support the business operations of its international branch network, and complements the Midas solutions already implemented at the bank’s overseas branches in London, New York, Singapore, Stockholm and Helsinki. The bank has also recently implemented the solution at its new branch in Shanghai, which  went live in April 2004.

“We are strongly committed to our strategy in North-East Europe of offering specialised services to our corporate customers. The overwhelming success of our operations in Scandinavia and the Baltic region over the past few years confirms this, and we are convinced that, by continuing to use Midas and expand this strategy into Poland, we will strengthen the position of NORD/LB as an important partner bank for German and local industry,” says Sven Herlyn, Executive Vice President at NORD/LB.

Mr. Herlyn goes on to say “An important factor for achieving uniform customer service is to standardise our operations on a common IT platform. Our existing partnership with Misys, and our use of Midas in our international branches, has already provided comprehensive business support to our expanding international corporate business. An evaluation process of optional solutions resulted in the decision to extend the Midas strategy to our subsidiary in Warsaw.”

The implementation of Midas, which was supported by resources from NORD/LB’s head office in Hanover, took less than 5 months. Piotr Puczynski, Managing Director of NORD/LB Bank Polska, explains: “We were extremely comfortable with the implementation process. The highly professional support provided by local Misys technical and business consultants, and our own extensive in-house knowledge of Midas helped to ensure a very fast and low risk implementation project.

Since going live with Midas, we have already realised a wide range of business benefits, including lower operational costs, lower operational risk and strong support of our business processes in important areas such as lending and dealing.”

Shamira Alidina / Adelaide Harrison
Write Image
+44 (0) 20 7959 5400
Shamira@write-image.co.uk / Adelaide.harrison@write-image.co.uk

Andy Coulter
Head of Marketing & Business Planning
Misys Wholesale Banking Systems
+44 (0)20 8879 1188
andy.coulter@misys.com

About NORD/LB Norddeutsche Landesbank
NORD/LB Norddeutsche Landesbank is the leading universal bank in North Germany and its business activities centre on North Germany and North-East Europe. As the state bank (Landesbank) for the three states of Lower Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg Western Pomerania, NORD/LB provides financing and support to local authorities and acts as a central bank for the 85 savings banks in these three states.

In line with its regional focus, NORD/LB’s has head offices in Hanover, Braunschweig, Magdeburg and Schwerin. In contrast to other state banks, NORD/LB also acts as a savings bank in the former Duchy of Braunschweig. The bank has full market coverage there with 115 branches and is outstandingly positioned with a market share of some 60 per cent in the region.

NORD/LB resulted from the merger of Niedersächsische Landesbank, Braunschweiger Staatsbank, Hannoversche Landeskreditanstalt and the Niedersächsische Wohnungskreditanstalt in 1970. Braunschweiger Staatsbank was established in 1765, which means that NORD/LB can look back on almost 240 years of history as a savings bank in the Braunschweig region.

With total assets of EUR 193,608 million (31 December 2003) NORD/LB Norddeutsche Landesbank is the leading bank in North Germany and ranks 10th throughout Germany as a whole. The Group has 1,775 employees.

About Misys Wholesale Banking SystemsMisys Wholesale Banking Systems is a trusted provider of innovative technology solutions. Over 1,000 employees in 30 offices around the world have built up the necessary domain expertise to deliver world-class solutions with an understanding of local requirements. Misys Wholesale Banking Systems' staff are committed to developing and supporting a product family that embraces trade services, international banking, treasury & capital markets, confirmation matching, continuous linked settlement (CLS), ebanking, middleware and financial messaging.

Misys Wholesale Banking Systems is part of Misys plc’s Banking & Securities Division, which serves over 1,200 customers across more than 120 countries, including 92% of the world's top 50 banks and 56% of the top 250. (Source: The Banker, July 2003).

Misys plc, the global software products and solutions company, serves customers in the international banking and securities, international healthcare, and UK retail financial services sectors. The group partners with its customers to deliver outstanding IT solutions to essential industries. For the year ended May 31, 2003, Misys reported revenues in excess of $1.8 billion. Misys employs more than 6,000 people internationally.